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Askar Batyrshin
Askar Batyrshin is a rookie cornerback for the Las Vegas Bandits. History Askar Batyrshin was born to a family of elite figure skaters. His mother, Guzel, is known as a former Olympic figure skater representing USSR & Russia, including one silver medal. His father, Ruslan, was also playing well in Russian domestic competitions before getting married and giving birth to Askar. That can easily explain Askar started skating at the age of 3 with his parents’ hope that he would become Olympiad gold medalist in the sport. Thanks to the amount of effort and his good coaches (a.k.a. parents) rather than natural talent his parents had, he had won several times from the age of 5 to 13. On the other hand, he was not a motivated kid and he just had followed his parents’ orders to practice. However, things suddenly changed when he was in 8th grade. One day, he came upon his clubmate at the school bullied just because he was dancing on ice, dressed. From that day, his daily life changed 180 degrees. He had even stopped to hide that he didn’t want to practice anymore in front of his parents. Furthermore, he tried to look manlier to avoid becoming a target of bullies, like acting and wearing crudely, working out crazily, and finally, he found the best way: football. Right after his first high school year started, he skipped a figure skating competition to participate in the selection event of the high school football team. Of course, his parents found out that he was trying to join the football team, and they of course didn’t allow him to do so. He, on the other hand, was not accordant with his parents. He chose to live away from his family, first stayed at his friends’ home, moving from one place to another, until he started living in a dorm provided by the high school. It turned out that his former sports experience, especially jumping and keeping balance and his stamina from long skating practices, was his forte to succeed in football. He liked how wide receivers and cornerbacks do from the beginning. Meanwhile, he actually (re)started practicing hard like he used to for skating competitions, after his parents told that they were not welcoming him, saying that they raised Askar to act and fly beautifully on the ice, and the family wouldn’t need those who can’t fly (“Qanatı bar oçar, oçmas koş qaytıp bulmas” / Those who have wings will fly, those who won’t fly can’t come back). He didn’t get angry with that; he rather deepened his enthusiasm for football practice - if he can play really well on the field, his parents would admit he can fly on fields too. He focused sorely on cornerback later, chasing balls, intercepting balls, smacking balls… anything related to midair battles, and worked on tackling WRs as well (not very willingly). The big turning point was the only playoff game in his senior year. He intercepted balls 3 times in a game (yet the team lost), and it has gotten college scouts’ attention. Especially, Avian Tech’s scout somehow remembered his name on the other sports career in his youth time. Askar explained why he stopped skating and started playing football away from his parents, and the scout promised that he persuade Askar’s parents. (Actually, it worked by showing videos of his highlights and offering scholarships at Div-I college and explaining why the scout is confident that he would play in the professional.) He finally ended up returning home right before graduation from high school, and he promised that he become better than he used to be in figure skating and his parents promised to come to some of his games and support him. On the other hand, as you might guess from what you have already read, he has a big flaw when he has started his college career. He was quite bad at tackling, run defense, any other not related to catching balls. He had been quite reluctant about the monotonous workout and running practice and motivating him to do those practice was the big problem. It was not enough that coaches shouted at him to make him practice other than ball catching stuffs, and it was until the entire defensive team beat him up that he concentrated on fundamental practices. Ah, plus he definitely started working out seriously since he was turned down by his girlfriend with the comment that he looks thinner and less attractive than other football players and some other student-athletes. (It also helped that he could use plenty of time for practice. Grown up in Slavic (Russian) and Turkic (Tatar) language spoken family, he didn’t have to study a lot for getting credits as a linguistics major.) His ball tracking and aerial fight are his big strength, and his speed doesn’t look so bad as an entry draft candidate. As a defensive player, there are still weak points in short distance plays, but he might have the potential to improve in that area under proper instruction. Rookie Scouting Report Brock Brezniski: I don’t know that much about figure skating, but I do know that Askar possesses natural agility and is not afraid to go up and contest passes; his avian heritage makes that even less of a factor. His work ethic and desire are top notch, and while corners aren’t usually expected to make a lot of tackles, that is the one aspect of his game that needs the most work. But he’s got the rest of it down to become an elite corner. Contract Info Statistics Individual Win-Loss Record Category:Cornerbacks Category:Avians Category:Las Vegas Category:2019 Draftees